


someone else's story

by heistsociety



Category: SKAM (TV)
Genre: F/F, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-01-27
Updated: 2017-01-27
Packaged: 2018-09-20 08:07:52
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,482
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/9482180
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/heistsociety/pseuds/heistsociety
Summary: ingrid never replies. jonas never felt real, more like a memory, always fleeting, always fading. the only thing that feels real is sara.





	

sometimes ingrid feels as though the world spins around her, like things happen _to_ her and not _with_ her, a static character in someone else's story.

jonas was a mistake, she supposes. he was never hers, always eva, eva, eva's, and ingrid was nothing but a bridge that joined the two together. perhaps that was why it stung so much. because ingrid thought she was finally getting her own story, her own great romance. because ingrid knew, knows, will always know that she is just a side character that will never appear again. 

maybe last year hurt so much because she lost two people that she loved so dearly. ingrid falls in love easily, with jonas' dark hair and square jaw and how he always tasted like whiskey and smoke. with eva's fiery locks and bright smile and her laugh that echoed for a thousand miles. 

they chose each other over her, each took half of her heart and carved it to pieces with every kiss, smile and stolen glance. 

ingrid feels empty the first year of nissen. the only thing that keeps her on her feet is sara. sara is the sun, she's warmth and reassurance and home, home, home, and when

ingrid is with sara, the rest of the world doesn't matter. if she lost sara, she's sure she would spin completely out of control, a rampage of self destruction with a match to set fire to the world. sara assures her she will be there, always, as they are pressed up against each other on the wall of a house party. _i won't leave you,_ sara whispers into her mouth, and she tastes of strawberries and sugar and stars.

ingrid used to have this with jonas, with eva.

~~ingrid will always have this with sara.~~

sara makes her feel like maybe, maybe, maybe, she'll have her own story someday, topped with constellations and whipped cream.

not that ingrid would ever say any of this out loud, not when these candy kisses are nothing more than practice for the real thing. 

 _the real thing that you had with jonas,_ sara always says. _until eva stole him. that bitch._

ingrid never replies. jonas never felt real, more like a memory, always fleeting, always fading. the only thing that feels real is sara.

she doesn't say this, though. instead, she nods and tries not to stare at sara's lips, pink as candy floss and fairy dust. instead, she searches for the real thing, back arched against the staircase at a halloween party, hands studying the sides of penetrator chris when she'd rather be studying sara's curves.

she regrets it the second that it's over, a nervous feeling in the pit of her stomach that whispers, says, screams, that something is wrong, wrong, wrong.

and it is. the rumors that chris hooked up with some girl at the halloween party, cheated on his girlfriend, hit her like a wall of bricks. ingrid can't breathe, feels like she's six feet under water because she knows what it feels like to lose someone and she never wanted to do that to someone else.

she tells sara and only sara, because sara won't judge her or betray her. this she knew, knows, will always know. 

ingrid later finds out that she had nothing to worry about, not really, when the rumors that eva was the one who hooked up with chris spread through the school like wildfire. maybe ingrid should feel relieved, but all she feels is sicksicksick at being a loose string that could unravel someone else's relationship, at the fact that everyone's talking about eva, jonas, chris, iben, about everything she'd rather forget.

ingrid tries to disentangle herself from the gossip and sara does her best to help, but ingrid is so present at school that she can't escape it. so she does what she can to steer things away from her. she says things that she regrets, that settle in her heart, stomach, lungs, and burn her from the inside out.

everywhere ingrid goes, it's like the universe is torturing her - with eva, jonas, chris, iben, with the little group of girls that hangs around eva like ingrid and sara once did.

ingrid wonders if they know what eva did to her, wonders if they know what she did to iben.

_"what happened to the fresh start this year was supposed to be?"_

sara sends her a sad, reassuring smile and steers the conversation to pepsi max or some new movie, turns on the radio and pulls ingrid into a dance, presses her lips against ingrid's and jokes that practice kisses are safer than the real ones.

sara knows that distraction is what ingrid needs, but ingrid only wonders if the distraction, if the practice and the friendship and the taste of strawberry lip gloss is more dangerous than the real thing.

( because ingrid is falling, falling, falling, has been, will always be, for the one person that she knows better than herself, inside and out )

ingrid is a ticking time bomb and when she explodes, it's not with shrapnel or fire. it's with words, lashed out at eva like a knifepoint. she tells the truth. a poison-coated version of the truth that paints eva as a movie villain. 

eva confronts ingrid in the girls bathroom and ingrid is half caught between fleeing and crying. seeing eva, looking her in the eye, it makes ingrid fill to the brim with anger and guilt and sadness. it's a supernova of emotions and it crashes over ingrid like waves on sand, over and over and over, a ruthless pounding. the only thing that hurts more than this is looking at sara, touching her, kissing her, and knowing that sara will never be hers.

ingrid barely registers what eva says, too busy trying to hold back the tears that threaten to spill from her eyes.

eva apologizes. the ocean creates static in ingrid's ears. eva knows that ingrid hooked up with chris. the noise becomes a suffocating pressure. iben steps out of the stall, five feet of pure anger and flames. ingrid can't look her shame in the face so she runs, runs to the place, the person that makes her feel the most safe and the most in danger.   
she runs to sara and little by little, the static fades to white noise.

then everything gets better, step by step in an uphill climb. christmas has always been ingrid's favorite time of year, and christmas is when everything seems okay again. ingrid doesn't hate eva, never did, never could. but ingrid doesn't love eva anymore, doesn't love jonas anymore, and realizes that eva and jonas was not the story that she wanted to be a part of, to be remembered for. ingrid swears that she won't do it again - she won't force her way into someone else's story. she'll weave her own story from silk and secrets, and she only hopes that sara will be a part of it.

but it's christmas and then new years and ingrid has no time to dwell on such somber things. she and sara bake sugar cookies and decorate both of their trees. they share a few frosting coated kisses later, in the back of a closet at the girl power christmas party, a few more as the clock ticks to midnight and it becomes january 1st. 

the next few weeks fly by. seconds turn to minutes that turn to days that turn to weeks and then suddenly sara is dating isak valtersen and ingrid doesn't know how to feel about it.

it's sickening for ingrid to watch. she hates seeing her best friend with her tongue down somebody's throat (one that isn't ingrid's, at least). 

sometimes, for a brief second, ingrid almost wishes that she could be isak, just to be able to kiss sara wherever, whenever, in front of anyone. 

( she quickly shakes those thoughts out of her head. ingrid would never want to be isak valtersen, and anyway, after jonas and eva and jonasandeva, ingrid promised herself she would never change anything for a relationship )

( a tiny part of her still knows that she would change the entire world for sara )

ingrid almost hates isak. at the very least, she hates that he barged his way into her story, wiggled his way into the arms of the girl that she loves. but sara seems happy so ingrid treats him with apathy, slight interest but mostly disregard. he does the same. it's not like ingrid and isak have any real reason to be friends, or even remotely like each other.

ingrid dealt with him when she was dating jonas, when he seemed to be around all the time, and now she's dealing with him. again. and he's around all the time. again.

ingrid is sure it's not going to last, and the kisses at sleepovers do nothing to oppose that. ingrid knows that she should feel bad about this, the way that she did a few months ago, but it's impossible for ingrid to feel bad when her lips are pressed up against sara's. in these moments, ingrid feels as though she could take on the world. but the next day, she's always reminded that she can't.

the fragility of the human heart is a funny thing.

sara and isak apparently can't keep their hands off of each other, and with every obnoxious touch, ingrid finds herself more and more in despair. 

ingrid focuses herself on other things instead, cafeteria gossip and pepsi max. 

 _apparently william got together with noora,_ someone tells her. _isn't that just odd? i could've sworn she hated him. it's too bad, anyway - william certainly is dreamy, isn't he?_

ingrid only shrugs, _he's all right, i suppose,_  and the look she receives is astounded. 

_are you kidding me? do you even like boys?_

ingrid does like boys, but how can ingrid even think about a stupid third year boy when sara's leg is pressed up against hers and they're so close together that she can smell sara's hair, green apples and an ocean breeze? ~~ingrid likes boys, but she loves sara.~~

when sara and isak break up, all that ingrid feels is relief. she feels guilty for only a heartbeat - sara doesn't seem all that torn up over it either.

the summer is a whirlwind of parties and laughter, and ingrid is sad to see it go. by day she was exploring the city and by night she was exploring sara's mouth. it was bliss, bliss, bliss, but ingrid knew it wouldn't be forever. nothing was forever.

so school came, a flurry of days and work, but with a welcome absence of drama. 

 _does it bother you that isak has that thing with that first year girl now?_  ingrid asks at one point, heart pounding, watching for sara's reaction.

sara doesn't even take her eyes off of the movie they're watching, her shoulders moving in an apathetic shrug. _why would it?_ she replies, and ingrid fights the urge to smile.

the moment crosses her mind again when someone tells ingrid about how isak valtersen is apparently seeing some third year boy. the moment and a silent wish that she could have that with sara.

when ingrid mentions isak and even to sara later, she doesn't even look surprised. _that explains why isak never seemed that into me,_  she says, and ingrid wonders how anyone could not be into sara. sara, who ingrid would swear was more beautiful than aphrodite, a goddess from the inside out.

isak and even are the topic of conversation now, and ingrid almost wants to laugh from the horribly irony. because somehow, her best friend's snapback-wearing, weed-smoking ex-boyfriend managed to beat her to the punchline.

ingrid is with jonas the first time that she actually comes face to face with isak after he and sara break up, after he and even get together. they're discussing a class - jonas has a firm grip on politics and whenever ingrid thinks about it, it just makes her head hurt and her hopelessness for the world grow. isak and even come as a pair to the conversation, and one of even's arms is lazily draped around isak's shoulders. there's a glow of happiness that surrounds them, and isak looks entirely different from what ingrid remembers. 

it's the way that he and even look at each other, she supposes, like the universe is held in each other's eyes, like the sun and moon and stars and every natural phenomenon wouldn't compare to the phenomenon that is standing in front of them.

there's a pang in ingrid's chest. she wishes that someone would look at her like that. ~~she wishes that sara would look at her like that.~~  
they tease each other, slightly, lovingly, easily. anyone could see how much they care for each other, a million miles away or standing right next to them.

it's too much for ingrid and she has to excuse herself.

now, more than ever, ingrid feels that she might never get her own story. 

the next time she and sara come close to kissing, ingrid pulls away at last moment and takes in a breath, acutely aware that she's just created a record-scratching, awkward freeze-frame moment that she doesn't know how she'll explain away.

ingrid glances over at sara, who has a confused and slightly worried expression on her face, and ingrid realizes that she doesn't want to explain this away.

if isak can admit his feelings to the entire school, ingrid can admit hers to her best friend.

 _i can't do this anymore!_  it's all going to come now, spilling like marbles from a jar, word after word after word and ingrid can't stop it. _j_ _ust kissing you and kissing you and kissing you and pretending like it doesn't mean anything, like i'm just waiting for the right guy to come along so that i can have a real relationship, or whatever! the only real relationship that i want is one with you. this isn't nothing to me, was never nothing to me. i love you. i always have._

ingrid can't look at sara, too afraid of what will be revealed in her eyes. ingrid knows sara, knows what she looks like in every emotion. even if sara tries to hide it, ingrid will know. she stares straight ahead - she can't bear to see disgust or anger or hatred on sara's face and know that she caused it.

a hand reaches out to ingrid and forces her to turn her head, and there is not disgust or anger or hatred on sara's face.

just a smile that reaches her eyes, one that could set the entire world aglow. _took you long enough,_  sara says, and they kiss, and it feels so very real.

ingrid thinks that maybe, just maybe, she's finally starting to write her own story.


End file.
